Day 2: Bend to Susanville

 

Today we drove from Central Oregon to Northeastern California, through small towns on highways with very little traffic. From here, you would never guess that California is the most populous state in the US.

The smoke caught up with us during the night, but we outran it as we approached California, at least for now. The drive was not the most picturesque, especially at first, because we could not see much through the smoke, and great portions of Oregon and some of Northeastern California are covered in miles and miles and more miles of sagebrush, as far as the eye can see. In a few places they have half-mile-long irrigation rigs and have flattened out the land for agriculture, but those areas are the exceptions. Sagebrush is the norm.

We drove past Albert Lake, still in Oregon, interesting because parts of it were almost dry, and we saw maybe 1,000 birds gathered on a dry bank. Then we had lunch on a bench next to Goose Lake at the Oregon-California border. On Google Maps, Goose Lake looks much bigger than Albert Lake, but Goose Lake does not appear to contain any water at all. It is just a really large, flat lakebed with grass growing in it and cattle grazing all along it. Apparently, it is a common occurrence that some of the lakes here go dry, especially in times of drought, although this is not a drought year. 

Motels serve some sort of breakfast, and we stopped at Safeway and got enough food for lunch and dinner, and that may be the way forward. The big expense is the motels, which run more than $120 with tax.

It is 95 degrees here in Susanville, and it will get hotter as we drive south along the east side of the mountains, approaching Death Valley, but the hotels are comfortable, and the car is holding up well so far.